Some notes about MDMA synthesis. Let's start with Bright Star. It's a workable synth, but it does have it's faults. First would be the use of peanut oil. Get a real high temp silicone oil. No one watches them and they don't smoke and don't have a habit of splattering (200°C+ oil hurts like a mofo, or hellfire as a research advisor of mine said). Next up is the methylamine from formaldehyde and ammonia. Jesus fucking Christ do not use this procedure as written. When it gets to the point where you start pulling vacuum turn the heat off and let it cool a minimum of 50°C. Never turn vacuum on a hot distillation no matter how careful you think you are. I used to do analytical distillations when I worked in alt fuel petrochemical research. The first fraction was done at atmospheric pressure, and the. You cooled it before turning on the vacuum, at least that's what you do if you don't want to see the mother of all bbumps, ruin your distillation and make one hell of a mess.
Next what's up with using DCM as a solvent? Yuck, find a substitute. Also look into alternatives to DMF for the Wacker oxidation. That's some toxic shit. In the distillation don't use vacuum for the first fraction. Which should not be DCM because don't use halogenated organics as solvents if you can avoid it. Finally I don't care if you are Woodward himself recrystallize that shit. It was just sitting in a solution of mercury. If you don't recrystallize it and give it to another person you deserve to be shot in the genitals.
So let's look at dr Drool's synth. This also starts with Safrole and uses DCM. Apparently the Hive died because everyone got cancer (seriously halogenated organics are bad). Why would someone vacuum distill nitromethane? You're gonna lose half of it to your poor pumps oil. If something boils at <150°C do an atmospheric distillation.
OMG a ziplock bag has no place around chemicals. Rh where's the note saying don't do this. The reductive ammination looks sound. Do these guys have something against recrystallization? Does that ziplock bag give it some extra kick.
So both synths are reasonable, provided some changes are made for the sake of safety (sanity?). Except that safrole is harder to get your hands on than a pig in a lube factory. So how do we get around this? We can make it ourselves of course. Back in the late nineties bulk sassafras oil was getting more difficult to obtain. Needless to say this was a major problem for some people. Well it turns out that if you heat allylcatechol sufficiently (~250°C IIRC) it thermally rearranges to to 1-allyl-3,4dihydroxybenzene. That's a methylene bridge away from being safrole. Hydroxy groups are pretty good nucleophiles, and deprotonation only makes em better. So it turns out dihalomethanes have a use in MDMA synth. Just as reagents, not solvents. DBM or DIM (Cl is a crap leaving group) mixed with your allylcatechol and some base and wala, you have safrole.
Sorry it took me a few days to get this posted. I've felt terrible the last few days